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Thursday, May 14, 2009

KG's Injury- Preserving the Dream

With the Cleveland Cavaliers sweeping their way to the Eastern Conference Finals, questions are being raised as to whether LeBron & Co. can manage to rattle off 12 consecutive wins en route to their inevitable trip to the NBA Finals. Through eight postseason games (4 vs. Detroit, 4 vs. Atlanta), the Cavs have look virtually unbeatable, posting an average margin of victory of just under 17 points, and emerging as not only the class the Eastern Conference (by some margin), but also the clear-cut favorite to capture the NBA title in June.

When the Cavs finally take the floor in the conference finals, they will square off against either the Orlando Magic or the defending-champion Boston Celtics, wh’ll be coming off a grueling 7-gamer. Regardless of the opponent, it’s pretty safe to assume that LeBron will make his second career finals appearance. While the consensus opinion states that the Magic will probably not win a single game, the Celtics, powered by the “heart of a champion”, are expected to win at least one win, and that a healthy Kevin Garnett would give them an actual shot at winning the series.

Wrong!

As totally backward as this may sound, the Celtics should be thankful that Garnett won’t be available should they move on to face Cleveland. The Cavs’ bloodthirsty, “on a mission” form this postseason, combined with Boston’s inconsistent bench play, it’s unlikely that KG would have any impact on the series’ storyline. Even with a healthy KG, it’s hard to imagine the Celtics pushing these Cavs to even a fifth game, let alone winning four out of seven. Like the Magic, the Celtics will take the floor on Sunday night and fight tooth-and-nail for the privilege of running headlong into the Cleveland buzzsaw. Garnett’s absence creates a hypothetical, “heart of champion”, and “defending the title” scenario that simply cannot occur in reality for Boston fans to “reasonably” play out in their minds.